Bear draws lottery tickets

You can't teach an old dog new tricks, but an animal trainer from New Hampshire proves you can teach a bear just about anything.

A trained bear at Clark's Trading Post has learned a new trick that will help raise money to care for animals.

Trainers have taught the black bear, named Echo, to spin a drum and draw a raffle ticket out of it. The person whose ticket is drawn will win a teddy bear made from real bear hair.

Maureen Clark said that she began training Echo about a week ago.

"I started to teach her to spin it, which she learned right away," Clark said. "The next trick was to get her to pick out one ticket — just one."

Echo will be drawing the ticket for real on Monday.

Clark's trading post came up with the idea of making a teddy bear out of real bear hair to raise money for the Lancaster Humane Society.

Clark's sister, Nola Grant, knit the teddy bear, and the hair came from another resident bear, Victoria. Grant said the hair was easily available from grooming the bear.

The teddy bear took about 20 hours to knit, but Grant said it was worth it to help a worthy cause.

"While I was knitting, my pug dog sat beside me smelling the bear hair and wondering what on Earth I was doing," Grant said. "I feel very good about it because we all love animals here and we've just been really happy it's going to a good cause," Clark said.

So far the raffle has raised more than $11,000. On Monday, all eyes will be on Echo as she performs her new trick by picking the winning ticket.

Clark did not mention if the bear is being considered to replace the Tennessee Lottery's computerized drawing, but it does seem to be more reliable.

WFMZ

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You can't teach an old dog new tricks, but an animal trainer from New Hampshire proves you can teach a bear just about anything.

A trained bear at Clark's Trading Post has learned a new trick that will help raise money to care for animals.

Trainers have taught the black bear, named Echo, to spin a drum and draw a raffle ticket out of it. The person whose ticket is drawn will win a teddy bear made from real bear hair.

Maureen Clark said that she began training Echo about a week ago.

"I started to teach her to spin it, which she learned right away," Clark said. "The next trick was to get her to pick out one ticket — just one."

Echo will be drawing the ticket for real on Monday.

Clark's trading post came up with the idea of making a teddy bear out of real bear hair to raise money for the Lancaster Humane Society.

Clark's sister, Nola Grant, knit the teddy bear, and the hair came from another resident bear, Victoria. Grant said the hair was easily available from grooming the bear.

The teddy bear took about 20 hours to knit, but Grant said it was worth it to help a worthy cause.

"While I was knitting, my pug dog sat beside me smelling the bear hair and wondering what on Earth I was doing," Grant said. "I feel very good about it because we all love animals here and we've just been really happy it's going to a good cause," Clark said.

So far the raffle has raised more than $11,000. On Monday, all eyes will be on Echo as she performs her new trick by picking the winning ticket.

Clark did not mention if the bear is being considered to replace the Tennessee Lottery's computerized drawing, but it does seem to be more reliable.

that would be a refreshing Idea animals drawing the number and just think , no overhead except food ; In PA they have a ground hog who predicts weather now a Bear who draws lottery tickets ,and not state contrled numbers I like it already;Tenns. here we come its Bearly- fleasesiable:

When they said "bear drawing" I thought they said "bare drawing" and there'd be a naked person drawing the numbers. OH well... hey, I think this is part of a super secret experiment as a solution for the TN Lottery. A bear picking the numbers is a LOT more honest and less problematic than their buggy new RNG system! I remember in the "Pepsi Billions" game they had a monkey pick those winning numbers.

Wow! Clark's is still in business? When I was a kid I thought it was so cool to feed the bears at Clark's and take a ride around on the railroad. The last time I went there, I wasn't a kid any more. I watched the bears sitting on these tiny platforms way up high in the trees. The idea was for the visitor to buy a treat and then put it in a cup. The bears were trained to pull on the rope until the cup reached them and they lowered the pulley so you'd do it again. I was so disturbed that I began to cry. I know the Clarks give money to charity and recently saved a local animal shelter, but it's also a lot of free national advertising for them. It's sad that their lives as a circus act is actually better than living in the wild where these magnificent creatures used to live for over 30 years, but now average 5 to 7 if they're lucky. Too bad they don't know how to build a condo or shoot a gun. Maybe a good compromise would be if the Clarks took some of the money they've been raking in from this roadside attraction for over 70 years and allow these animals to roam in a protected sanctuary. After all, the state motto in NH is "Live Free or Die."